It is no elementary school musical version of Scarface, but in it's own way I find it just as amusing.

Government Control over textbook content?

Is Stop the ACLU worked up over nothing? I have never heard of the Federal Textbook Act but it apparently gives the government the ability to review the cost of textbooks and implements some “solutions” to prices that are climbing much faster than the rate of inflation.

The part that has NRO and Stop the ACLU worked up is a requirement that textbook publishers inform faculty members considering a new edition of a textbook what changes were made between editions. Stop the ACLU is looking at this as an attempt to control content but anyone who attends college knows that one of the major complaints of students is publishers rearranging content or adding some questions to push out a new edition at substantially higher prices and forcing adoption by not printing the older editions any longer. This appears to be an effort to address that.

I don’t really think it is the government’s place to be involved but I also don’t think there was a nefarious plot.

(Note; This law was signed by George Bush in 2008. It became effective this year)

I know it's not BSG or 24, it's better. It has full frontal nudity, including Xena: Warrior Princess' breasts on display every episode, and gladiators gladiating.

And for you folk into menfolk, they don't skimp on the full frontal nudity of the gladiators who only wear loincloths when they're not diddling Roman matrons or standing around nekkid for said Roman matrons to gawk at. Unfortunately, for you, they already killed off the gladiator with the huge wang.

I haven't watched soap operas since Luke was diddling Laura, but this one is pretty darn good. There have been 10 episodes so far (you can watch them all at the above link) and they were almost all pretty darn good. One or two were place holders (but they showed full frontal nudity so it wasn't a waste) but the rest have been good. This week's, in particular, was very good.

There's only two things I'd say weren't periodically accurate. They use 'thumbs up' to mean, "Let him live" and 'thumbs down' for "Kill him", instead of the way it really was. Thumbs down meant, "Drop your weapon", i.e. let him live.

They also have most of the contests end in death, from what I've read, most of the contests didn't end in death unless the loser didn't fight well and they gave him the "thumbs up". Gladiators were expensive so you didn't want your valuable slaves being killed off too quickly.

Except for that, I'd say it shows Rome of that time fairly accurately.

It's good but be warned, it's brutal. They use 300-style effects, including lots of heads being lopped off in great sprays of blood. The 4th episode "The Pit" was especially brutal what with the cutting off a dude's face and all.

March 26, 2010

Looking at education

Since we were talking about books earlier I thought I would recycle one of my old posts discussing how I think education could be more efficiently delivered. Its kind of long winded so I put it below the fold.more...

I saw the link at the puppy blender's, just like you, and clicked to see if it was the Missing Link, but it wasn't. It was something cooler.

They just found another kind of intelligent hominid from 40,000 years ago that we had absolutely no idea had existed. That's pretty cool.

I wonder, did we ally with that type to kill off the neanderthals before killing and eating them or did we ally with the neanderthals against them before finishing off the neanderthals or did they form an alliance against us so we killed and ate them both at once? And did they taste good? I bet, like us, they tasted like pork. I wonder if we made bacon out of them.

It really shows how little we know about the Earth. They never realized there was another type of human or near human living at the same time as us and the neanderthals.

So we're 2-0 so far against other intelligent species.Goooooo Us! May we continue undefeated until we kill ourselves off.

After reading a grammatically horrifying tweet from somebody named Ke$ha to somebody named Justin Beeber (or something) I started thinking what great artists/authors/politicians/playwrights would have said on twitter.

So, we're doing either their famous works on twitter or just anything they may have written. I'm expecting a lot from you.

Can Scientologists gain exemption from the health care mandate because it pays for anti-depressants and they are against them? I heard somewhere that the Amish get an exemption on religious grounds. Maybe we need to start a "Conservative" religion.

Wait, you want a guy with one eye to review a 3-D movie seen in IMAX? Really? Allrighty then. It was okay but....

I had to wear the stupid glasses or the screen was blurry. So I didn't see 3-D but I did get a headache. 1 star for us blinks. My double eyed friend thought it was okay but he said the effects got too busy once in a while.

March 22, 2010

A democratic government is the only one in which
those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.

The best part about robbing people this way is that you don't have to
dirty yourself by holding the gun in your own hand.

And on this dark day, it may be difficult to see where it all ends short of fulfilling Alexis de Tocqueville's prediction of a two century republic.

But I know something that reassures me that the final ending will be on the side of freedom. That is, simply, that the people who would choose to hide their theft behind politicians and platitudes surely haven't the courage of their convictions.

In the end, when it is time to do violence on behalf of one's beliefs, those that rob us with marginal rates and non-compliance fines would hide, teeth chattering under their beds when they were forced to COME AND FUCKING TAKE IT.

So, rest more easily. Not easy for we are in a dark time, but don't fret for our children's children because, so long as we secure the foundational right of our republic, they'll never be able to completely vanquish us.

March 20, 2010

Presented without context

"Let's face it, ice cream trucks are kind of queer, and a middle-aged white man driving one is pretty suspect," Quint said. "That's not to say that I'm a rolling hotbed of perversion. Hardly the case. It's all in the name of silly."